Stories, rants and reflections by a clueless father of three

Shawn Kuykendall’s Facebook page is an epically peculiar compilation of thoughts, pictures, and downright shenanigans. It’s a place where every day is #throwbackthursday, female drivers are mocked at any given moment, and fashion faux pas are promptly called to the world’s attention.

Stretching back to 2004, Shawn’s Newsfeed is no quick read. See, Shawn’s the kind of guy who will let you know, via social media, that he has decided to take a bath while eating a chocolate Drumstick. So pretty much NOTHING has gone undocumented.

With that in mind, I recently spent literally hours upon hours scouring his Newsfeed, reading every last comment, post, link, and birthday wish for the last ten years. It was a marathon, not a sprint. But what I found was far from dissapointing. Here goes Part 1…

2004:

Shawn joins Facebook in October. That’s important. Then someone reminds Shawn that he is a “10 out of 10” when it comes to being physically attractive. Another labels him a total “hottie.” Bottom line: Shawn is a bona fide Hottie McHotterson. Like, totes magotes.

2005:

At some point this year Shawn became a professional soccer player. On July 28, he apparently played soccer against some team named “Chelsea” and switched jerseys with some guy named Frank Lampard. My guess is that this was a big deal, but I must confess I’m not much of a soccer guy. Indeed, the only “Chelsea” I’m familiar with was a resident of the White House in the 90s, and it would be really awkward if he had switched jerseys with her…

In other news, “Deluxe” was a word Shawn used (and perhaps overused) quite regularly. For instance, friend Jason McGraw posts “how does it feel to get served in front of all your people in the VIP? Keep it deluxe, son. Deluxe.” Somewhat confused, I consulted Urban Dictionary, which uses the word as follows: “So, I was in this new club and these hot twins kept buying me drinks all night – it was so deluxe!”

Umm, yea. “Deluxe” just might be my new favorite word.

2006:

This year’s highlights include a gig playing soccer with the New York Red Bulls, a profile pic that resembles Ace Ventura Pet Detective, and a run-in with “Norman the Zebra.”

Hey Norman!

Which kind of reminds me of this picture…

Good times.

May 10: Someone suggests that Shawn start a boy band. I’ve always kinda wondered if this was his true calling in life. Think: better pay, and fewer knee surgeries. For names, may I suggest The Shawnsington Boys? Or Deluxe? Or my personal favorite: The Smelly Shin Guards? Just something to think about…

Oh, and here’s a video that proves I may be right about Shawn’s prospects for a career in pop music:

2007:

Things really started taking off this year. I counted 228 separate friends who posted on Shawn’s wall at a time when there’s no chance I had 228 friends – Facebook or otherwise.

Here’s one of my favorites from Ms. Susanne Tortola: “remember when you used to tuck us in burrito style and then give our stuffed animals hugs to smell all funky?”

WAIT A MINUTE NO FAIR!!! Shawn’s never tucked me in burrito style…

Here’s another, from Mr. James Smith: “if you’ve ever seen the movie Cold Creek Manor, you look a lot like the bad guy. I’m a little scared of you.”

Here’s who Mr. Smith is talking about:

There’s a resemblance…

Also, 2007 is when Shawn regularly begins using several variations of the word “sick” to describe things that, ironically, are actually quite favorable or satisfactory. These include “sick,” “sic” (without a “k”), and “siiiiiiick” – as in, “I love that Freelance Whales song…it’s so siiiiiiick.”

For now, the variation of choice is “sickaness” – spelled with a seemingly unnecessary “a.” Ex: “The Wombats are quite simply put… The SICK-A-NESS.”

A meaningful synonym for “sick” (and all variations thereof…) is “silly.” Silly can be spelled the old fashioned way, or it can be misspelled (preferably in all caps) as follows: “Ryan Reynolds’s performance in The Proposal was SILLLAAAAYY!!!” (I will touch on Shawn’s ridiculous man-crush on Ryan Reynolds in a subsequent post…). “Silly bazilly” is also an acceptable variation, and if you don’t have the time to write all that out, “bazilly” works too…

To clarify: those are all ways of saying “silly,” even though the word “silly” doesn’t actually mean silly. Are you following?

Speaking of silly, what follows is a picture of what very well could be Shawn crashing the 2007 James Madison High School Homecoming Dance. I’ll leave it to him to explain otherwise.

Rule #7: Blend in by sticking out.

Editor’s note: as it turns out the picture above was a premiere for this work of brilliance by Scott Jeschke, starring Shawn as a bad guy with a rather legit Russian accent. As suspected, most members of the cast were in fact students at James Madison High School. Check it out:

In addition to hanging out with high schoolers, Shawn was in Germany this year, and provides several suggestions of up-and-coming German bands. The entirety of my knowledge of German rock is based off a late 90s song called “Du Haste,” the video of which features a bunch of creepy dudes screaming “You Hate!” in German, mixed with some overly serious power riffs on the guitar. To this day the video scares the crap out of me, so I’m definitely open to any other suggestions Shawn may have.

And speaking of music…

Yep, what you just watched was a video of Shawn Kuykendall dressed a bit like Fred Flintstone (with his sister Sami) while dancing out of his parent’s basement and a trashcan – all to the tune of Real McCoy’s Another Night. Rendering it YouTube gold.

As I scour through 2007, it’s clear Shawn was years ahead of the “selfie” craze. See, according to the Internet, the selfie became popular in 2010, and a legitimate phenomenon in 2012. But here we are years beforehand, with the skill already mastered:

Brace yourselves for MANY more selfies to come…

2008:

Apparently Shawn went dark in 2008. All we get from 2008 is a picture of a friend pointing out a super-sized zit on Shawn’s forehead, which obviously is fantastic.

Shawn’s siiiiiiiiick zit.

2009:

Another year of undocumented randomness. Although I will point out that this was the year he had Enrique Iglesias’ “Bailamos” as his ringtone – which is characteristically SILLLAAYY for Mr. Kuykendall.

And that about wraps up what I categorize as the “pre-Twitter” years of Shawn’s Facebook page. But worry not, because the next segment of this little series contains endless amounts of fashion snobbery, botched sporting predictions, Bible verses, bizarre Shawn-isms, and world-renowned Christmas videos.

I know, but you took the effort to go through his feed! he was an amazing guy! Shawn is the reason I’m even able to type this. He changed my perspective, with just a few words of encourage… and I will never ever forget what he did for me with just words